


in ways i can't describe

by SunSparrow



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Fantasizing, M/M, Masturbation, Secret Crush, Sexual Content, Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-08
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-15 22:54:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29691192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SunSparrow/pseuds/SunSparrow
Summary: It's been years since Yuta's unfortunate mishap with a nasty, weirdly powerful hedge witch, but the fact still stings. Yuta can't touch anyone—not even his pretend fiancé, Mark.Mark just has to learn how to cope. (And hopefully find a cure along the way.)
Relationships: Mark Lee/Nakamoto Yuta
Comments: 14
Kudos: 113
Collections: Challenge #5 — I heard a secret..





	in ways i can't describe

Leaning against the training yard's ramshackle wooden fence, Mark watches the war-mage Yuta at practice. The bright summer sun beats down against the nape of Mark's neck, and he's probably burned red by now.

Still. It never ceases to fascinate him, watching the way Yuta effortlessly combines both his inherent fire magic and graceful swordplay. Whether in training exercises against imaginary opponents to increase speed and reflexes, or against the element-resistant training dummy, Yuta is beautiful, and graceful.

Mark can hardly believe that Yuta is all his, a giddy feeling rising in his chest.

"I don't think I've ever seen anyone so thirsty for their own fiance." A teasing voice breaks through Mark's romantic tunnel vision.

Okay. _Sort of_ all his.

"Johnny!" Mark exclaims, whirling around with wide eyes at his friend. "Shh!" Mark glances at Yuta even though they're so far away the other boy couldn't possibly hear.

"Thirsty," Johnny repeats slowly.

"Stop that, you don't understand. I'm not, and... He doesn't... He won't even touch me!" Mark pouts a little, leaning again on the fence and hiding his cheeks in his folded arms to conceal his growing embarrassment. Mark feels ridiculous for even saying it, because—

"But he can't, can he?" Johnny looks confused and slightly concerned. "Because, well, you know."

"Well, yeah, he can't. Not while the curse is still there," Mark sighs.

It's been years since Yuta's unfortunate mishap with a nasty, weirdly powerful hedge witch, but the fact still stings. Yuta can't touch anyone.

He just... sucks life from anything he touches.

Mark still remembers the _awful_ look on Yuta's face, stumbling into his home, panicked. Mark had been at the table, reading, but got up to see what was wrong.

Yuta had _hurled_ himself away from Mark, crashing into the coat hanger in the corner. He had beckoned Mark outside, then shoved his hand into a patch of grass, the blades shriveling up at his touch.

Mark still remembers the time a butterfly landed on Yuta's bare shoulder and crumpled into an ashen wisp.

Mark clenches his hands into fists. He glances at Yuta and his serene look of concentration on his training before turning again to Johnny. "I'm working on it."

"You are, and we're all grateful for it." Johnny pauses. "I thought the engagement was supposed to be platonic, anyway."

"Well, yeah, but—" Mark cuts himself off, frustrated for some reason he can't name.

Johnny offers a crooked smile and a comforting hand on Mark's shoulder. "I believe in you, Mark. You can break the curse. If it's anyone, it'll be you."

* * *

_Yuta looks so_ apologetic _when he asks Mark to marry him. He looks so miserable, and so, so sorry._

"I have a favor to ask, Mark."

_It turns out that the king, in order to knight Yuta, needs Yuta to prove that he isn't a danger to anyone despite the fatal effect of his curse. That he can live among others and fight alongside allies without hurting anyone he doesn't mean to._

_So._

"A marriage?" _Mark squeaks, frozen in his tracks._

"Well! Yes. And no! Just a betrothal. An engagement. You know?" _Yuta stammers, clearly trying to salvage the situation, and more uncomfortable and nervous than Mark had ever seen him to be._

_Cool, confident Yuta, always brushing off the hateful remarks and working his hardest for scraps of respect, miserable to ask his childhood friend for a favor. Mark knows how much Yuta hates feeling like a burden._

_Who is Mark to say no?_

_How could Mark_ ever _say no to Yuta?_

"Just until I get knighted. Then we can break it off, I promise. I'm sorry, Mark. I understand if you say no. It's just—I don't know whom else to ask. I'm so sorry."

_Mark wants to clap his hands over Yuta's mouth, wants to stop this stream of words from coming out, but he can't._

_So he just says, sharply, his words so edged they could be broken glass:_

"Yes. You don't even have to explain. Yes. I'll do it."

_Yuta doesn't look like he can smile. Keeps searching Mark's face for the real answer, like it's hiding somewhere in his eyes._

_So Mark smiles instead for the both of them, swallowing down a lump in his throat that hadn't been there before._

* * *

Mark swipes a sleeved arm across his forehead, collecting beads of sweat and some natural dyes from the wafted fumes of crushed herbs. Leaning over a boiling cauldron is probably doing a number on his skin. He shoulders open Yuta's house door, stumbling in and kicking off his boots in a pile beside the door.

Movements made easy and sure by repetition, he gently places his bag onto the dining table. He sets aside a medium-sized vial with foggy green liquid, a little cork plugged into the top.

He so badly needs a bath. Peeling off his robes and underclothes, Mark heads straight for the washroom, summoning some water into the wooden bath with a basic elemental spell.

He warms it up with some whispered words, running his hand through the water and making it bubble a little with heat. With a long, relaxed sigh, he sinks into the water, thinking over the different equations and measurements he had to cross out today in his experiment log.

Outside his regular potion work, Mark spends at least an hour each day researching the components of the curse and how it can be reversed. He refuses to think that it can't. Because Yuta doesn't deserve that.

It feels hopeless though, and it breaks his heart a little to not be able to tell Yuta that he's making progress. Because it feels like he's not. Pages on pages of crinkled paper recording failure after failure. Yuta always obediently accepts and swallows down whatever herbal concoction Mark has brewed for him that day, no matter how nasty, every day after training.

With no visible result.

Sighing, Mark pulls himself out of his thoughts and out of the bath, then vanishes the water without a trace.

He starts rummaging through his personal shelf in Yuta's dresser, finds a shirt, underwear, and trousers and puts all of them on.

Yuta has a designated drawer at his place too; they regularly enter each other's houses without any prior notice. They've known each other for years. They have nothing to hide. 

Tugging at the hem of his shirt, Mark glances at the empty suit of leather armor hanging on the wooden stand, as well as Yuta's sword. He has a couple of them to practice in, but the full steel plate armor is still out of reach. Once Yuta gets knighted, he'll receive a real sword and armor, their respective hilt and chest emblazoned with the crest of the king's personal squadron of knights.

Mark sighs. Maybe that day is sooner than he knows. He glances at the simple promise ring on his left hand, not yet used to the feeling of something constantly on his hands.

Maybe a year from now, Yuta, a full-fledged knight, will tell him to remove it, their vow finally fulfilled.

There's a sharp twinge in Mark's chest.

It's hard to sort out what he wants from Yuta. 

Mark squeezes his eyes shut, thinking back to this morning, seeing Yuta gripping the practice sword in one hand, and the orange flame in his other bare one.

It's a secret, but... Mark likes to look at Yuta's hands whenever he takes off his gloves.

They're pretty, and Mark can't help but wonder what they would feel like on his body. Touching him slowly, running down his chest and gripping at his hips. Skin to skin.

Yuta grew up and Mark is painfully aware of the fact. The four year difference between them seems heavier, farther. But... it's okay if he imagines, right?

Mark's just a little curious.

Before he can hesitate, he removes the armor from its stand. He shifts the heavy, dense leather onto the bed, considering. Climbs on top of the abdomen, runs a slow, assessing hand down the center of it. Settles down to sit on it. Feels the cool surface through the thin linen of his pants.

What is he _doing?_ But Mark is already whimpering a little and flushing, feeling himself chubbing up already, thinking about straddling Yuta like this, while he's wearing his practice leathers.

He impulsively reaches over and grabs the bottle of flaxseed oil on the nightstand as well. He spills a little on the smooth leather surface. He takes off his thin pants before he ruins them. And he sits on the leather, right in the middle of the pool of oil, where it's dripping down the sides onto the bed sheets. It's lewd, and disgusting, and Mark doesn't know what he's even doing.

He shifts a little, sliding his half-hard dick and oil-soaked sac across the slick leather, and moans at the gliding pressure. Loudly. His moan chokes off at the end, and Mark bites down on his lower lip in panic, filled with anxiety that someone might have heard. But he doesn't hear anything but the birds. He calms down, breathing, staring down at his own hard dick against Yuta's armor.

One of the advantages to being a well-known cursed person is that no one wants to live by you. Mark is grateful for the seclusion, because he can be as loud as he wants. And Yuta won't come back for a while. Mark usually just chills or studies.

But now, Mark grinds a little more into the boiled leather of the armor, moaning at the delicious pressure on his dick. He's seen Yuta without a shirt, without other things. Yuta's stomach looks soft, but firm, just the faintest lines of muscles tracing down the center. 

Mark whimpers, thinking about rubbing his cock into Yuta's abdomen, still slimy with sweat from his sword practice. Thinks about rubbing his dick against Yuta until he's coming all over his stomach. Thinks about, maybe, letting his dick rub against Yuta's. It's probably pretty, when it's hard and red like Mark's is right now.

"Yuta," Mark says, so quietly. He feels his throat tighten at how good it feels just to say Yuta's name like this.

Mark runs his own fingers over his lips, feeling how soft they are. He moans, thinking about Yuta touching him like this, feeling the way Mark's lips cradle the sound of Yuta's name. The want in him is so strong, he lets out a small, needy, pathetic whimper. His eyes feel hot, like he could cry if he tried. Even just a little.

_"Hey, beautiful."_ Mark wants it, can almost _hear_ the words, and he whimpers hard. His shoulders tense in anticipation, and his heart _aches_ for it. That fondness in Yuta's voice. The kindness and gentleness in his touch that Mark misses, can only imagine now. With a shaky sigh, Mark reaches a hand up and caresses his own throat, the line of his jaw. Like he's a precious thing.

Just like Yuta would. If he wanted to.

A sharp pang hits Mark's chest at the reminder.

If Yuta _wanted_ to touch Mark.

But Yuta doesn't want to.

Mark closes his eyes. It's okay. He can pretend for now. Just to get off and feel good. He twists his hips a little against the leather armor, his brows knitted in sharp concentration.

Pretending it's Yuta.

* * *

As Yuta slowly enters his front door, unlocked, he smiles fondly at the rumpled pile of Mark's belongings on his table. Spotting the vial of trial potion as well, he uncorks it and drinks it down. It's floral, tangy, and tastes like dandelion leaves and something else floral.

Yuta shrugs. He's had way worse.

Mark shouldn't waste his time on Yuta's curse, but he insists, selfless person that he is. Yuta can't help but love that about him. Mark has already sacrificed far too much for Yuta.

Now, the moment of truth, like every day before. Like however many days it'll take in the future.

Yuta waits a second, tempering his heart against the incoming disappointment, before reaching out with a bare hand for one of the fresh wildflowers sitting idly in the vase.

But then he hears Mark's loud, pained cry from the direction of his bedroom and he drops the flower. Immediately, his mind races to the worst case scenario: Mark, succumbing to curiosity, trying to practice with Yuta's sword. Getting hurt. Bleeding out on the floor for hours before Yuta comes home.

Yuta tugs on his gloves, cursing, and rushes over to open the door, only to find the incarnation of a heart attack on his bed, straddling his best suit of leather armor.

"Mark?" he says in shock. His brain hasn't quite caught up to his eyes, which are drinking in the sight of Mark, his lithe, slender body, that toned ass, riding his leather armor on the bed, pre-cum beading on the tip of his cock.

"Yuta," Mark moans dazedly in answer, and Yuta is instantly rock-hard at the sound of his name—his name!—spilling from his friend's red-bitten lips in such lustful tones that Yuta's only heard in his best dreams.

"Fuck." Yuta mutters a curse under his breath and grips the front of his trousers, which are suddenly far too tight. "Baby, what are you doing with my armor?" he says, so gently, not wanting to startle Mark. "You didn't... you didn't inhale something strange in the lab, right?" Yuta says, still trying to get his dick under control if Mark accidentally breathed in some sort of aphrodisiac.

"No..." Mark moans softly in answer, whining, "Wanted you so bad, wanted you when you were practicing. You're so hot. So good." Mark throws his head back, grinding his dick between the leather armor and the flat of his hand. "Yuta, please. Wanna come all over you," Mark mutters, flushing red at the words, eyes still partly closed, lost in fantasy. His dick is so hard, and red, looks like it's about to burst. Yuta's not going to stop him.

"Then come, Mark," Yuta says, reaching out with his gloved hand and gently gripping the back of Mark's neck, his thumb tracing over the slope of his throat. It's like his touch sets off a trigger in Mark, who gasps and comes hard, all over the leather, the pearly white liquid slipping against the clear oil.

Mark gasps, trembles in Yuta's gloved grip, slowly coming down from his orgasm. Then he opens his eyes, tries to lean into Yuta, but Yuta stops him.

"Oh, oh no, Yuta?" Yuta can pinpoint the second reality hits Mark. Mark looks horrified, embarrassed, but his eyes are dilated with desire and he is so frozen he doesn't even struggle to cover himself.

"Mark, _beautiful,_ you should've told me earlier. I could've helped you out with this," Yuta coos.

"N-no, Yuta, I thought you were coming home later!" Mark stutters, cute, eyes wide and dark and beautiful.

"I'll come home earlier if it means coming home to such a gorgeous siren in my bed," Yuta says, tempted to lean in and suck love bites all over Mark's chest. Mark stares at him with longing, eating him up with his eyes.

But.

"The curse," Mark says, and he doesn't need to say more. Yuta knows in an instant that neither of them care. They'll find a way around it.

Yuta would never hurt Mark.

"We can enjoy each other in other ways until it's lifted," Yuta says, voice low and dangerous.

Mark shivers, reaching out to thread his fingers safely with Yuta's gloved ones.

"Again," he says, asking. "Again, please."

And who is Yuta to ever say no to Mark?

* * *

Outside on the table, all the wildflowers bloom fresh.


End file.
